dementor daycare ii
by queendementor
Summary: it's time for the daycare field trip, and les and barty have their hands full.


**dementor daycare ii**

 _a/n: i cannot be held responsible for any deaths caused by whatever this is_

It was the morning of the daycare's field trip. Barty checked the children to ensure they had permission slips signed and lunches brought along. Les spent her time trying to answer the barrage of questions from parents there to drop their children off.

"Draco won't be partnered with Alecto, will he?"

"Will you make sure Newt doesn't drop his niffler?"

"You'll remind Harry about taking turns in talking, correct? He's quite chatty."

Les assured Cam that she'd monitor Harry's conversations, promised Tassie that she'd keep an eye on the niffler, and confided to Ella that with luck Alecto wouldn't show up.

But it was not to be. Les could make out, "Auntie Dragon, why do I have to wear this?"

Peering into the hallway, she saw Dragon, who had brought along Credence, Scabior, and Alecto. Scabior tried to feed Nagini random things while Credence attempted to get him to stop, while Dragon was redressing Alecto for the third time.

"Because, sweetheart, you know Les likes to lecture, and she'll be more inclined to do so if I don't at least drop you off fully clothed."

When she finished replacing Alecto's clothing and was satisfied that she wouldn't try taking it off again, Dragon ushered the procession through the door to the daycare.

"Good morning," Les politely greeted them.

"A good morning indeed," Dragon watched as Scabior wandered off to play with his friend Newt. "Just so you know, I may be retrieving Alecto tonight as well. It depends on what Maisie and Amycus are up to."

"I'll keep that in mind," promised Les.

After waving to those she'd brought with her, Dragon said, "Make sure they enjoy themselves. And don't let Credence or Alecto get too upset."

Before Les could ask why they would, Dragon was gone.

Barty counted everyone and came up with seven children (well, five children and two adults,) two chaperones, and a large snake. Everyone was there. They could leave.

"Does everyone have their lunch?" Les asked.

They did.

"Did everyone bring in a permission slip?"

They had.

With that, Les propped open the door, and she and Barty led the group out to the bus.

-x-

"Now, before you sit down, it's important we learn who our partners will be. You'll be sitting with your partner on the bus, and you'll be with them while we're there. This way, no one will get lost."

"Who's your partner, Auntie Les?" piped up Harry.

Les gave Harry a small smile. "I suppose mine is Uncle Barty, Harry."

"Oh. Okay."

Severus decided he wanted Draco as his partner, and Newt claimed Scabior. This left the chaperones to figure out how to divide Harry, Credence, and Alecto.

"I'd put Harry with Credence, but I think you'll agree that wouldn't be enough supervision for Alecto. Who knows what she could get into while we're busy with the others," Barty commented.

"True," Les paused to think about this. "Maybe we could put Harry with Draco and Sev, which would leave..."

She was cut off by Nagini's sudden transformation from a large snake into a human.

"If you don't mind," she said. "Perhaps I could be partners with Credence, which would eliminate need for further divisions."

Les thought about it, then decided it was probably the least disastrous option and gave her consent.

This enabled her and Barty to pile everyone onto the bus. Draco and Sev sat in the second row, behind Sev's mother. Across from them were Newt and Scabior, behind them Credence and Nagini, and across from them Harry and Alecto. Scabior kept trying to stand up and Barty repeatedly told him to sit back down, but this was the only loading interruption.

The moment they left, Barty and Les heard the chatter of Draco and Severus.

"I wike having cake. Do _you_ wike having cake, Sev?"

"I wuv cake! Chocowate is my favowite."

"Their little conversations are so adorable," Les whispered to Barty.

Behind them, Harry too chatted up a storm.

"I'm glad we're going to a nature park. I like nature parks. The kind with animals are the best. We go sometimes and we feed the animals. I hope we can feed the animals. But sometimes they bite, though, gotta watch that. I don't bite, though. Because it's icky and you don't know where things have been."

Harry either didn't know or didn't care that Alecto, leaning against the window with her chew toy in her mouth, had no interest in conversation and had been tuning him out the entire time.

"So, Alecto," Harry continued, gently poking her. "I hope the animals don't bite you either. Because it's yucky, and that's bad manners."

Still nothing. When Harry poked her a little harder, she seized his finger, raised it to her mouth, and did exactly what Harry said was bad manners.

"Auntie Les!" he shrieked, waving his affected finger in the air like he just didn't care. "Alecto does _not_ have good manners!"

"I know, dear," she called back to him. "But as long as she isn't hurting you, there's nothing I can really do, Harry."

It was then that Barty, who had noticed, informed his fiancée that Harry's finger was very clearly bitten. She gave him a bandage with Snitches on it, which he loved and insisted on showing everyone else on the bus, and told Alecto that if she bit anything other than her chew toy, she was going to get a consequence that Les was certain she wouldn't like at all.

"Not that that will do anything," she muttered to Barty. "She'll just tell Maisie or Dragon that I'm being mean to her and they'll yell at me. I guess all we can do is hope she doesn't want to learn what that consequence is."

Just as they pulled into the parking lot, Nagini leaned over the seat and gently poked Scabior's shoulder. When he turned to face her, she said, "Just so you know, I do not like to eat muddy shoes. Scrape off that mud and I'll eat them for you."

Scabior scraped the mud off onto the seat in front of him, then grinned and handed the shoes back to Nagini. By the time Credence realized what she was doing and tried to stop her, all that remained was half of a shoelace.

The bus pulled up beside the park's entrance, allowing Les and Barty to help the children dismount. Draco and Severus were the first two off. No one else seemed to be following.

Barty popped his head in. "Is everything okay in here?"

"Scabior doesn't have any shoes!" reported Newt.

When he investigated, he found Scabior sitting in his seat, occasionally kicking his feet, covered only in a pair of red socks. "Scabior, where are your shoes?" Barty asked.

"I gave 'em to her," Scabior replied.

"Who did you give them to?"

"My apologies, I was hungry." Nagini piped up from behind them.

Barty tried to get the conversation back onto a direction that made sense, but was forced to conclude that Nagini had eaten Scabior's shoes.

"I apologize, sir. I tried to stop her, but I suppose that didn't go very well." Credence told Barty when asked if he knew anything about this.

Sighing, Barty scooped up Scabior, hoping there would be shoes at the gift shop that he could buy for him.

When Harry prodded Alecto, who had fallen asleep, to wake up, Barty was less than surprised when she threw a tantrum. At the sound of her crying, Blueberry, Credence's pygmy puff, was startled and escaped from his grasp, prompting him and Nagini to search the bus for the fleeing puff. Confused by this turn of events, Harry and Newt got off the bus and ran into the arms of the waiting Les.

"What's going on in there?" Les asked.

"A mess," was all Newt said.

It was ten minutes before the mess was resolved. Nagini managed to capture Blueberry under a seat, and Barty was able to calm Alecto down with her chew toy and get her off the bus, even if she insisted on holding his free hand.

After that trip, the chaperones were glad to finally get everyone into the nature park.

-x-

The guide giving the group a tour established two things when he encountered the group: that his name was Angelo, and that the gift shop did not sell shoes. Les and Barty decided they would just have to take turns carrying Scabior, as Dragon hadn't thought to pack him backup shoes.

"Now remember," Barty said as he tried to pry Alecto off. "You are to _stay with your partner_ at all times. This is very important, because I don't need any of you getting lost. Does anyone know what to do if they do get lost?"

"You find a new mummy and go home with her?" suggested Newt.

"No, you never do that," said Les, suddenly grateful that Scabior, among the group's wanderers, would not be doing anything like that on this trip. "You stay where you are until we can find you. You can ask people in the uniforms, those who work here, for help, but no one else, understand?"

Six nods of understanding. Alecto, once again biting her chew toy, clearly hadn't been paying attention. Rather than go over the safety rules again, Les sent Barty to the back of the line to monitor her and Harry.

"Remember what I said about staying with your partner," she told the group as Angelo began to lead them into the park.

He started the group on a trail, from which many trees were visible. Before Angelo could even point them out, little Newt had picked up a bowtruckle.

"He wikes me!" Newt exclaimed, fascinated as the bowtruckle escaped his grasp and perched on his shoulder.

Scabior, who was now able to reach the trees, also took a bowtruckle. Harry, Draco, and Severus crowded around Newt's, even though he insisted that no one was allowed to touch the bowtruckle for fear that they might scare it. Credence kept Alecto and Nagini away from the bowtruckles, as he didn't trust them not to bite the little creatures to death. At first Alecto was upset, but then she and Nagini wound up conversing about fun things to bite and her unhappiness was forgotten.

"I like biting pygmy puffs, just not Fiona," Alecto said. "Because Fiona is shiny, and biting shiny things makes them stop being shiny."

"Oh, I've never bitten a shiny one before," Nagini replied, glad she'd found someone else who liked to chew on puffs. "I'll have to try one. Though I do prefer eating the puffs instead..."

Nagini was cut off by the voice of Angelo as he insisted that Newt and Scabior put the bowtruckles down so they didn't hurt them. Scabior, who had moved onto pulling Barty's hair by now, was fine with this, but Newt pouted and quietly began to cry into his plush niffler when Angelo took his away. Deciding it would be easier than trying to pull him along, Les scooped Newt up, told everyone to reunite with their partners, and continued following their guide.

The small boy's tears were gone when Angelo led them into the habitat of the fwoopers, and when they made it to the erumpents, Newt was halfway up the protective fence before Les was able to grab him. She made a mental note to ask Tassie where he'd learned to scale fences.

After they observed the phoenixes, Alecto abruptly took a seat on the trail and began to nibble her chew toy. "Auntie Les, what's she doing?" Harry asked when he noticed his partner was absent.

Barty passed Scabior to Les and backtracked to where Alecto sat. "Alecto, I don't know what you're doing, but it needs to stop. We still have to see the demiguises and the dragons before lunch, and we're already running behind."

"I don't wanna walk anymore. I'm too tired."

"Okay," Barty shrugged. "You can stay here, then. We'll stop by and pick you up before we head back to the daycare."

Alecto glared at him. "If you do that, then...then I'm telling my mommy!"

Barty froze, then sighed and lifted Alecto into his arms. He wasn't afraid of much, but the stories he'd heard about the wrath of Maisie weren't good.

-x-

After the dragon exhibit, Angelo led the group to a set of picnic tables so that they could have their lunch. As she'd expected, Newt tried to feed his celery to his niffler, and Draco dumped his apple slices into Sev's bag when he noticed that Ella had packed him a cookie. Scabior kept trying to snatch desserts, and Les looked for somewhere to relocate him, but there was nowhere else to put the little snatcher.

Sighing, Barty stepped in and traded Harry's seat for Scabior's, then told him he had to behave if he wanted to sit with the grown-ups. Scabior agreed, but when Barty left, he poked Credence with a graham cracker until Nagini hissed at him, then tried very hard to grab one of the ample shiny cookies that had been packed for Alecto. When Scabior picked up the graham cracker again for what looked like another round of poking, Nagini scooped him up and set him down between Harry and Newt.

Newt was pleased, as this reunited him with his friend, but Harry wasn't happy, as he now had no one to talk to. Mood dampened considerably, the boy reluctantly returned to his carrot sticks.

Remembering what Les had told her previously, Alecto finished her sandwich with little fuss, and was relatively well-behaved as she nibbled through a few cookies. But she was rapidly growing bored and uncomfortable, so when Sev spilled yogurt down his shirt and Les and Barty were busy comforting the child and cleaning him up, Alecto bolted from the table.

Once she was far enough away that no one from the group could see her, she relieved herself of her clothing and dumped it in a pile, then lay in the grass beside it with her chew toy. Much better, she decided.

The meal came to an end, and Barty, upon noticing Alecto had apparently seized her opportunity to wander, decided it would be best to have Credence and Nagini look for her while he and Les attempted to round up the toddlers, who had finished eating and were now running around.

"Barty, help me!" Les said as she picked up the muddy-socked Scabior, who promptly began to flail in her arms.

He tried to come to her aid, but before he could, Harry pounced. "Hi, Uncle Barty! Enjoy the nature park? I know I am! I hope we can feed some things. My favorite was the dragons, but Newt likes the bowtruckles. And that's okay, right, Uncle Barty? What's _your_ favorite?"

By the time Alecto's search team returned, Scabior was settled, but still a little squirmy, in Barty's arms, Harry had moved on to Les, who listened patiently and answered his questions whenever he stopped for a breath, and Draco, Sev, and Newt were obediently lined up. Barty heard Harry happily describing the layout of his bedroom to Les, so he excused himself briefly and went to talk to Credence and Nagini.

"Any luck finding her?" he asked them, then winced as Scabior grabbed a handful of his hair. "Scabior, don't pull hair. That's not nice."

"She...she doesn't have..." Credence suddenly went the color of a tomato and trailed off.

"Her clothes on?" Nagini contributed.

"Yes, that."

 _Oh, no._ Barty couldn't deal with this. "Thank you," he got out, before hurrying over to trade places with his fiancee.

-x-

It took Les longer than she would have preferred to get Alecto's clothes back on (and inform her that removing them was not acceptable behavior,) then convince her to rejoin the group. Once Angelo returned to collect them and show the children a few more creatures, she checked her watch. One-fifteen. Less than an hour until they could go back to the daycare.

Angelo paused the group to look at the flobberworms, but when they failed to produce anything interesting, they complained until he suggested they stop and see the nifflers instead. Little Newt was enraptured, and merrily introduced his own plush niffler to his living counterparts. The nifflers were loved by all but Alecto, who was nearly pounced upon when they saw the shiny sprinkles still clinging to her mouth and dress. Angelo was able to lure the small creatures away from her, but she and Newt, upset for different reasons, still whimpered as the group was led away.

When they stopped next, Angelo grinned as he pointed out another exhibit. "Can anyone tell me what these are?"

"They're pygmy puffs, like Fiona," Alecto answered.

"Very good, Alecto," he replied. "They're just little puffs of fur, really. You can go on and hold them if you like. Just as long as you're gentle."

Les and Barty relaxed as the children explored the pygmy puffs, but that lasted about a minute until they heard, "Sir, I think this was a bad idea."

Barty was confused, as all he saw was Newt having the time of his life, as well as Scabior being trailed by a group of yellow puffs as he ran. But Les' eyes found Credence and Angelo, and beyond them, Nagini, green tufts of fur around her mouth as she reached for a red one.

"STOP!" she shouted.

Everyone stopped. Scabior's yellow puffs were too close behind him and knocked the little boy over, but he was far from dismayed. Newt, with identical purple puffs on his shoulders, frowned and gently began to set them down. Alecto, who looked about to either try to adopt the white puff in her hands or bite it, was startled and launched it into the air, where it landed perfectly in Nagini's mouth and joined the green puff as a snack.

"What lovely flavor these puffs have," Nagini said. "We must remember to visit the nature park more often. Simply delectable!"

"I don't think those are snacks, Nagini," Credence said as Blueberry timidly peeked out of his pocket.

Once she realized exactly what she had done, Nagini was horrified and apologized profusely to Angelo, but the damage had been done. He politely whispered to Les and Barty that the establishment would prefer it if the group didn't come back.

Les was almost relieved to hear this as she loaded the children back onto the bus. Draco and Sev happily recounted tales of their field trip, but they seemed a little droopy as they took their seats, and she knew they'd sleep most of the way back. Harry chatted excitedly to Alecto, who just appeared to be over the whole thing, and Les couldn't blame her. Nagini debated which form to return in, and eventually decided to turn herself into a snake and drape herself over a seat. The muddy Scabior happily planted footprints on the back of the seat in front of him, and Newt...where was Newt?

"Here I am!" he exclaimed, holding up his plush niffler as if to say that it too had successfully arrived. Les set him beside his partner, then sighed in relief as the bus began to move.

They had just pulled back into the daycare parking lot when Les heard...

"Scabior, dis is Pickett. He's my new fwiend. Say hi, Pickett!"

"Hi, Pickett! My name's Scabior."

If she didn't know better, Les would just assume Pickett was the niffler, but she knew it wasn't. She risked a peek back at the pair, and found a bowtruckle perched on Newt's shoulder.

"Where did you get that?" she asked.

"At the nature park!" Newt said excitedly. "I taked him home wif me, Auntie Les!"

So that was where he'd been when they couldn't find him.

"Barty," she said, poking her fiance awake. "How are we supposed to tell Tassie that her son stole a bowtruckle?"

-x-

Ella was already waiting there when they arrived. "Thank you so much, Les!" she said. Turning to Draco, she asked, "Did you have fun, Dray?"

Still rubbing the last traces of sleep from his eyes, Draco nodded.

The small boy was scooped up and carried away by his mother, who promised to contact Les about a playdate, when Cam arrived. She handed over Harry and said, "Believe me, I bet this little guy will tell you everything!"

In the short break before Dragon arrived to retrieve her group, Alecto began to draw pictures of everything she could think of and stick them to the wall. The daycare walls filled with pictures of everything from Fiona the pygmy puff to what looked like Credence and Nagini dancing a tango under a palm tree. Les didn't dare ask.

Dragon stepped through the door only to be pounced upon and hugged by little Sev, though thankfully he wandered off to play with blocks before too long.

"Apparently Maisie and Amycus are going to dinner, so I'm here for Alecto as well," she said to Les. "But that aside, how was the trip?"

Les decided to just admit everything. "Alecto thought it would be a good idea to take her clothes off, and Nagini ate Scabior's shoes and two pygmy puffs."

"She ate _what?_ "

"Scabior's shoes and two pygmy puffs."

"No, I understand the puffs, but why did she eat his shoes?"

"From the sounds of things, he told her to."

"Nagini," Dragon's tone was stern.

The Maledictus drooped a bit in apparent shame. "I'm sorry, Dragon."

After confirming that Credence still had Blueberry with him, and hadn't exploded or eaten anything strange, Dragon shifted her attention to the muddy Scabior, and then to Alecto, who had just run out of drawing paper. "Come on, sweetie. Auntie Dragon has a huge box of rice just waiting for you at home, and maybe later we can bake cookies."

"Yay!" After securing Alecto's final drawing in her purse, Dragon took her hand and Credence's, watching Nagini and Scabior from behind as they exited the daycare.

This left Sev, evidently close to going back to sleep, and Newt, who still had one more bowtruckle than Les would have preferred. And of course Tassie was there for him immediately.

"Mummy!" Newt launched himself into her arms, niffler bobbing precariously as he ran. "Meet Pickett!"

Tassie glanced at Les.

"Newt may have...stolen a bowtruckle...from the nature park."

"Why did you let him do this?"

"I didn't know."

Giving the pair a look, Tassie debated going back to return the little creature, but there was something about Newt's bond with Pickett that she just couldn't say no to. "Okay," she said with a sigh. "We'll be back soon. Say bye-bye to Auntie Les, Newt."

"Bye-bye, Auntie Les!" the toddler repeated. "Pickett says bye-bye too!"

She gave the pair a wave, then turned to see Barty, lying on the floor with Sev perched atop him. Both were asleep.

After the day she'd had, Les was so tired she curled up beside Barty and joined them.

 _-end-_


End file.
